By Mark Atkinson for MSN Autos

There are plenty of sports car racing fans who denigrate the Grand-Am Rolex series for being too much like NASCAR because of the focus on driver safety and team equality. After this past weekend's Rolex 24 at Daytona, though, it's hard to argue that they haven't built up an equitable series.

Despite having significantly smaller budgets than big-name teams like Target Chip Ganassi or Suntrust Racing, Michael Shank Racing used a combination of guts, driver talent and luck to win the 24 hour race on its eighth try. Both the winning #60 and the second-placed Starworks Racing entry were brand-new Ford-powered Riley cars that had barely turned a wheel in anger before pre-race qualifying on the Thursday before. Shank was doubly happy because his second entry, a much older Ford-Riley that at its best was two or three seconds a lap slower than the new-reg cars, remained on the lead lap after 24 hours and rounded out the overall podium.

The both big-dollar Ganassi entries - BMW-powered Rileys - had trouble with gearshifters and gearboxes, putting them too far behind to match the speed of the Ford-powered rivals. The heavily-favoured 'Corvette' prototypes had rough races as well - lots of unexpected teething problems that kept the big-guns in the garage early.

In GT, Porsche had a similar night, with the small Magnus Racing squad holding off bigger-budget squads from The Racers Group and Brumos Racing. Despite issues with front splitters affecting all 911 teams, the proven Porsches held off the relative newcomers from Ferarri, Audi and Dodge, along with proven winners from Chevrolet, Mazda and BMW. 

The GT field had over 40 cars entered, and promises to remain that competitive for the rest of the season.

For full results, click here. 

By Mark Atkinson for MSN Autos

And we're not talking about a small-block-V8-swapped 240 Wagon either. Apparently a local Swedish driving legend, Boije Overbrink, a fellow who recently broke the world land speed record for semi-trucks, brought out his green Volvo truck to a drag strip, challenging a Ferrari to a drag race in the process. While the Ferrari isn't the latest and greatest, an F360 Spider is nothing to sneeze at, especially when you're racing a giant Volvo truck.

Overbrink's ride obviously has a story here or else this wouldn't be so interesting... the truck looks to be tube-framed, the engine moved behind the cab, and the 16-litre twin-turbo diesel engine has been tuned to 1,900 horsepower, AND is also supplemented by a 200 horsepower electric engine. Yeesh.

Check out the video to see who won... we won't spoil it for you, but the results are closer than you'd think.

By Mark Atkinson for MSN Autos

We've all heard the terrible tales of mechanics and dealership employees joyriding in exotic customer cars that are in for service. Mustang Cobras, BMW M3s, Impreza WRX STIs have all been victims. And given that most of the ones that surface involve attention-getting vehicles, it's probably a larger problem than we might imagine. 

Jalopnik.com seems to have stumbled on the daddy of them all, though. According to the site, a Houston-area mechanic wrote-off a half-million-dollar Ferrari F40. The driver was going twice the posted 35 mph speed limit, lost control, jumped a curb and hit a fence. The whole car is a write-off because the carbon-kevlar tub - essentially the structural strength of the car - was cracked and deemed too expensive to repair.

What's even worse is that the F40's owner was away in Europe at the time, and didn't even learn of his Ferrari's fate until he arrived home.

I haven't had this sort of thing happen to me - at least to my knowledge - but I'd be pretty ticked if a mechanic dinged my car's door, let alone write off a reasonably irreplacable Italian supercar.

Has you been the victim of a joy-riding mechanic or lot boy? What would you do if caught in this situation? 

By Greg Kable, AutoWeek

Ferrari has unveiled the 458 Spider, claiming it to be the first series-production, mid-rear-engine car to be equipped with a folding hardtop roof.

Set to make its public debut at next month's Frankfurt motor show, the 458 Spider forgoes the traditional fabric hood used by the earlier 430 Spider for a newly developed, Ferrari-patented hardtop claimed to automatically fold back and stow ahead of the engine bay in 14 seconds at the press of a dashboard-mounted button.

By Luca Ciferri, AutoWeek

Ferrari will replace two of its five core models, the 430 Spider and the 599 GTB Fiorano, in the next two years, while adding a sportier variant to its best-selling model, the 458 Italia.

Here is a look at Ferrari's future product plans ...

By Jake Lingeman for MSN Autos

If you're looking for a late Father's Day gift, or maybe just a present for the CEO who has everything, a selection of exclusive Ferrari office chairs can be purchased from www.racechairs.com.

The rolling, adjustable office chairs look the part, and they should, considering that they were removed from real exotics. Prices for the licensed Prancing Horse chairs start at about $5,000, with the Ferrari 16M model coming in at the sale price of $12,999.

By Mark Atkinson for MSN Autos

This year's 24 Hours of Le Mans, the biggest sports-car race in the world, was supposed to be the closest in years. Recent changes to the regulations forcing smaller engines, new aerodynamic pieces and re-jigged classifications. Those who have a passing interest in racing will know by now that Audi won again - its 10th victory at the Circuit de la Sarthe in France since 1999 - this time with its R18 racer piloted by Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer and Benoît Tréluyerbeing chased by a quartet of Peugeot 908 cars in the LMP1.

Perhaps the most shocking news is that Audi had entered three cars but only one survived. The first was destroyed just into the race's second hour when Scot Allan McNish got a little optimistic when trying to pass slower traffic, and tagged a Ferrari 458 (in a much slower class) in the middle of a medium-speed corner. Both cars went off into the gravel, and the R18 virtually disintegrated when it hit the tire barrier, just as it was supposed to. Those carbon-fibre bodies and chassis are strong, but are designed to direct crash energies away from the driver's cell, which is why modern crashes usually look more dramatic than they really are. None of the spectators or photographers standing near the barrier were hurt with flying debris, either.

Thankfully, McNish crawled out of the wrecked car on his own, and after a check-up, was medically cleared.

Audi's luck wasn't looking great, though, as in the middle of the night, the then-leading R18 with Mike Rockenfeller was cut off by another Ferrari 458, this time unexplicably. The contact pushed the R18 through a hard left, and it hit the guard rail going about 270 km/h. Again, Rockenfeller was able to get out of the wreckage on his own, the car giving its life to save the driver's.

While there are some similarities between the two crashes, there are a number of factors that separate them. The blame for the first can pretty much be laid at McNish's feet - and perhaps the very restrictive viewing area out of those new R18 coupes. The Ferrari driver did what he was expected to, couldn't have known there were two Audis behind, let alone that one would try a pass that far into the corner. Case closed.

The second is perhaps the most obvious example to date of sanctioning bodies opening the doors to those with more money than talent in order to fill the expected number of grid positions. This is a fact of modern racing, and every single series in the world has them. It was an amateur driver behind the wheel of the Ferrari that put Rockenfeller into the wall. Because the economy has affected so many sponsorships and "fun funds", series do what they can to get cars on the grid. What makes the incidents at Le Mans so dangerous is the difference in closing speeds, which between the top-flight LMP1 and lower GTE-Am can be 80 km/h or more. It's even worse when that second driver is a rookie, hasn't raced at night much, and let his chequebook do the talking.

Oh, and congrats to Chevrolet for winning both GTE-Pro and GTE-Am in its centennial anniversary with the Corvette C6.R.

By Greg Kable, AutoWeek

Ferrari has revealed a one-off version of the 599 commissioned by New York-based art collector and property developer Peter Kalikow.

Called the Superamerica 45, the new open-top car was created to commemorate the 45th anniversary of Kalikow's first Ferrari purchase, a secondhand 400 Superamerica convertible. It will go on public display for the first time at this weekend's Concorso d'Eleganza Villa D'Este on the shores of Lake Como in Italy.

Ferrari has released only limited details, but the Superamerica 45 appears to combine design elements from the limited-production SA Aperta revealed last year and the 575M Superamerica that went into production in 2005.

By Michael Bettencourt for MSN Autos

New York City, N.Y. – Nissan’s plug-in Leaf hatchback has been crowned 2011 World Car of the Year, marking it as the first all-electric vehicle to do so.

When Chevrolet won the honours for World Green Car of the Year, it didn’t bode well for the all-electric Leaf. After all, if an all-electric car was beaten out by a gasoline-powered plug-in hybrid for an environmental award, what might that say about Nissan’s hatch? Furthermore, having been trumped by the Volt in the green stakes, few expected the Nissan to overcome larger, faster, and more luxurious World Car of the Year rivals, namely the Audi A8 and BMW 5 Series.

Mark Atkinson for MSN Autos

While Chevrolets, Chryslers, Fiats and Toyotas are fine for most folks, those looking for a little more verve at the 2011 Canadian International Auto Show would be well-served to visit the inaugural Concorso Exotica display on the 100 level of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

Stuffed to the gills with six-figure supercars and ultra-luxury machines, the Concorso Exotica exhibit is sure to get the blood pumping. Great Britain – surprisingly – has the highest representation of vehicles thanks to examples of the four-door Aston Martin Rapide, Bentley Mulsanne, Lotus Evora and Rolls-Royce Ghost.